by Alex Scarrow
‘This is correct. Superstitious nonsense.’
A patrol of legionaries approached them, their chain mail and belt buckles jangling, eyeing the locals warily. Liam watched them pass by, one or two of them sizing up Bob’s massive frame. Soldiers patrolling streets that didn’t welcome them; streets populated by seething Judaeans who would readily swarm over and tear to pieces any Roman foolish enough to wander alone. He imagined those young men were just as nervous of the local population as they were of their occupiers.
Liam spared a thought for those two soldiers he’d briefly come to know when they’d visited Ancient Rome. The retired centurion Macro, and his friend, the tribune Cato. Comrades in arms. The final glimpse he’d caught of them was their last stand within Emperor Caligula’s palace, two soldiers fighting back to back to buy Liam and the others a chance to escape into the sewers. He imagined one day he might go down like that: battling against impossible odds with Bob right beside him. There’d been something about their decades-long friendship serving in the legions that had stayed with him. He knew either man would have sacrificed his life for the other.
He knew Bob would do that for him without a thought.
Would I? He looked sideways at the support unit and felt the answer. Of course he would.
‘We should attempt to disguise ourselves as pilgrims and enter the temple again,’ said Bob. ‘We will need to enter the building. Inside there must be an access way to the structure beneath the temple.’
‘If it’s even there.’
Bob nodded. ‘Yes. There is no certainty of that.’
They needed to pass as Jewish pilgrims. As two faithful men with something ready to sacrifice. ‘I think we need to be wearing those tea towels on our heads.’
‘Information: they are called prayer shawls.’
‘Aye, well, we need one of those each. And an animal to kill. Preferably something like a goat. I’m guessing the birds-in-a-basket are just for the ladies.’ His stomach rumbled and gurgled insistently. ‘Oh, and I really need some breakfast. I’m hungry – how about you?’
Bob nodded. ‘Agreed. Protein is required.’
‘Right, then – no point sitting around like a pair of scolded naughty boys … we need to get hold of some shekels.’
‘Do you wish me to acquire some?’
‘Aye, discreetly, though, Bob. No need to start a riot. Let’s just pick someone, follow them down a backstreet, then you can do your thing and intimidate the be-Jay-zus out of them.’
Bob scanned the marketplace for a moment, then slowly stood up. ‘I have identified a candidate to steal money from.’ He nodded at a malnourished woman dressed in the rags of a slave, a basket of bread loaves hanging from her lean arms and a cloth bag dangling on her hip from a belt tied round her waist.
Liam made a face. ‘Can we rob someone who isn’t going to be whipped to death by their owner for losing their money?’
Bob nodded, then surveyed the marketplace again. ‘I have another suitable candidate.’ He pointed towards a bearded man in fine patterned robes reclining on a litter being carried by four emaciated-looking slaves wearing threadbare rags. He was wafting a smouldering incense stick in front of his face and in the other hand he held a long crop, which he used every now and then to hasten his slaves along, swatting the shoulders of the poor men at his feet.
Perfect.
Liam smiled. ‘Ah yes … that’s much better.’ He got up and rubbed his hands together. ‘Shall we?’
CHAPTER 16
2070, Interstate 80
83 days to Kosong-ni
‘See, now … this is exactly why I been takin’ us parallel to Route 80. Walkin’ ’cross rough country instead of walkin’ down the guddamn road.’ Heywood lowered his binoculars and pointed. A quarter of a mile to their right, on the highway, they could see a twisting thread of smoke rising up into the sky from the burning remains of several hand-pulled carts.
‘That’s another bunch of migrants who didn’t have a T. S. Heywood lookin’ after them. They been hit by jackers.’ He shook his head. ‘Poor fools.’
‘We should go see if anyone needs our help,’ said Maddy.
‘Won’t be anyone left behind alive over there, miss. Jackers’ll have taken everythin’. What’s left behind is either useless to ’em or just plain dead.’
‘It is an unnecessary risk, Maddy,’ said Becks. ‘Our objective is to reach the Median Line.’
Heywood nodded. ‘Your organic’s probably right.’
Maddy turned to Rashim. ‘C’mon, we ought to look, just in case?’
He shrugged. ‘Maddy is right. There may be some supplies they missed.’
Heywood sniffed. ‘Unlikely. On the other hand, whatever happened there’s been an’ gone. Guess it won’t hurt.’
Five minutes later, they were picking their way along a convoy of half a dozen carts and improvised rickshaws, their contents spilled out across the cracked asphalt road, systematically picked through and looted. Nothing left behind but broken things, impractical and useless family heirlooms, photographs scattered from an open album and clothes.
And bodies.
Maddy squatted down beside one of them. She found herself studying the lifeless open eyes of a teenage girl. Sixteen? Perhaps seventeen? Her auburn hair was tied back in a plait, and she wore a grey hoody and a threadbare T-shirt with some long-faded brand logo across it. Round her waist was a leather belt, a quiver beside her, crossbow bolts spilled from it on to the tarmac. One hand was clasping something tightly. Maddy pulled it from her stiffening fingers. It was an old iPhone, just like hers. The screen was cracked and scratched almost to the point of being opaque. It must have been a generation-to-generation hand-me-down. The girl was wearing earphones and she could hear the soft and tinny tik-tik-tik of a beat still playing.
Incredibly, the old thing was still working.
She reached across the phone and unplugged the headphones. Silence. It seemed the right thing to do.
Heywood came to a halt beside her. ‘That girl is one of the lucky ones.’
She looked up at him. ‘Lucky, was she? How do you work that out?’
‘Jackers’ll take you alive when they can.’ He studied the dead girl for a moment. Two dark stains from bullet wounds across her chest had merged into one. ‘Either they had more breathers than they could handle between them and they executed those surplus to requirements … or she tried to make a run for it.’
Maddy stood up and looked around. There were other bodies in a ditch beside the road, lying side by side. Either they’d been dragged over there, or shot where they’d been lined up.
Jesus. Gunned down in cold blood.
‘They’re the lucky ones,’ added Heywood, following her gaze. ‘Trust me.’
‘These jackers, what do they want with people?’
The old man made a face. ‘You really want to know?’
Maybe she didn’t want to know, but still she nodded.
‘They’re food.’ Heywood walked over to the bodies in the ditch and started picking through them for anything that might be useful.
Rashim joined her. He looked shaken and ashen-faced as he took in the bodies. ‘I did not realize how bad things had become out east,’ he said. ‘I was living on the ordered side of the line. There’s electricity, food, law and order, even broadcast digi-channels over there,’ he added, nodding westwards. ‘I had no idea how terrible it was out here.’
Heywood gave up looking through the bodies and stepped back out of the ditch. ‘Guddamn animals!’ he snarled. ‘When the guddamn guv’ment drew that big red line right down the middle of this country, they were givin’ up on over a hundred million US citizens. Leavin’ us all to starve out east.’
He turned to Rashim. ‘I just hope you’re as important as she says you are.’
‘Yes … he is,’ replied Maddy.
Just then Becks called out. ‘Maddy!’
They turned to look up the highway. Becks had a gun levelled at something.
‘What is it, Becks?’
‘There is a survivor on the back of this cart,’ she replied. They hurried along the convoy of carts and joined her. They saw a small pallid face peering out from the dark space beneath a tarpaulin.
‘It’s a kid!’ Rashim turned to Becks. ‘For God’s sake, lower your gun.’ He stepped forward and slowly pulled the tarp aside. The child recoiled from him, whimpering. ‘It is all right … I am not going to hurt you.’ He eased the rest of the tarpaulin away. It was a girl. She looked about seven or eight; her thin arms were wrapped tightly round her knees, drawn up protectively in front of her face. Her fingers interlaced, locked together.
‘Hey there …’ he said softly. ‘We are not going to hurt you.’ He held a hand out towards her. She stared moon-eyed at his hand, trembling, immobile.
Maddy shook her head. ‘She’s in total shock.’
‘Of course she is,’ said Heywood. ‘God knows what she’s just witnessed.’
Rashim leaned a little closer and she suddenly screamed. He stepped back quickly. ‘All right, all right.’
‘Suggestion,’ said Becks. ‘Perhaps the child is afraid because you are both male.’ She stepped forward, hopped up on to the back of the cart and squatted down in front of her. ‘I will not hurt you,’ she managed to say in an almost soothing soft murmur.
The girl eyed her warily.
‘I will protect you,’ said Becks, extending a hand to her. ‘Come out now. It is safe.’
The girl stared at her, eventually stirring. She let go of her knees and reached towards Becks’s hand. The support unit closed her hand gently round the girl’s, pulled her towards her, then scooped her up in her arms.
‘I’ll be damned,’ uttered Maddy, as Becks stood up and dropped down off the back of the cart, holding the child close to her chest.
‘We can’t bring along every waif and stray we find along the way, you know that, don’t you?’ said Heywood.
‘We’re not going to leave her behind, if that’s what you’re suggesting.’
They’d stopped for the night at a small drive-through, one-motel town and made their camp in the empty shell of an apartment above a long-abandoned grocery store.
‘We got food for just the three of us and your organic. We got damned lucky with that stag, but I’ll bet you that’s the only food we’re gonna happen on between here and the line. We can’t be pickin’ up charity cases along the way.’
‘So what are you suggesting? We just leave her to starve out here? Or worse?’
Heywood stroked the grey bristles on his chin. ‘You hired me to guide you out west, miss. An’ that was on the understandin’ that what I say goes.’
‘Well, we’re not leaving her here.’
‘She’s a mouth we didn’t figure on feedin’. She’ll slow us down too.’
‘Maddy …’ Rashim shot a glance at the girl, lowered his voice. ‘Our mission objective is everything … literally everything. Maybe Heywood is right?’
‘Mission objective?’ Heywood frowned, pursed his lips and sucked on them with a whistling sound. ‘Mission objective? OK, I’m gonna say this out loud because it’s really beginnin’ to trouble me …’
They both stared at him.
‘Mission objective?’ he repeated. ‘Who the hell are you people?’
‘We told you. We’re –’
Heywood shook his head. ‘See now … I don’t buy your story. The whole “we been out of the country” thing. You two? It’s like you popped out of thin air, like you just climbed out of a hole in the ground. Like maybe you just crawled out of some bunker … or maybe even some large guddamn test tube? Like maybe you been educated in some kinda vacuum.’
He narrowed his eyes. ‘You know … if I was the suspicious, conspiracy-minded type, I might be wonderin’ if your organic here ain’t the only piece of meat-ware.’
Maddy suddenly laughed and dropped her head. ‘You’re saying you think we’re combat clones like Becks?’
‘Maybe not combat ones. Maybe a different kind?’ said Heywood. ‘Either that, or you two been livin’ on another guddamn planet!’
‘Look, Heywood … we’re just normal human beings and all we want to do is get to –’
‘I know you ain’t been level with me.’ She noticed Heywood’s hand wasn’t so very far away from the assault rifle lying on the floor beside him. ‘I got a pretty well-tuned crap detector. An’ “mission objective” sounds like more to me than gettin’ yourselves somewhere nice an’ cosy beyond the Median Line.’
They sat in silence for a moment. He was waiting for her or Rashim to tell him something that sounded less like a badly thrown-together cover story.
‘We’re not machines,’ she said finally. ‘OK, yeah … ours is a very, very long story, Heywood.’
He shrugged. ‘Well, there ain’t no sports game to watch tonight, so why don’t you just tell me?’
She looked up at him and sighed. ‘Why not? It’s not like you can change anything in the time that we’ve all got left.’
‘Maddy?’ Rashim leaned forward. ‘Is that wise?’
‘Does it actually matter what he knows? Now? I mean, really? With just two to three months left? What the hell difference is it going to make to anyone?’
‘Two to three months left?’ Heywood turned from Maddy to Rashim and back again. ‘Two to three months left until what exactly?’
She turned to look at him. ‘What if I told you we know that in a few months’ time … something’s going to happen that will wipe out mankind.’
‘Wipe out …?’
‘Yup, you heard that right,’ she said. ‘The end of mankind.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Lady … you’re not makin’ any particular sense to me right now. You gonna tell me what the hell you people are up to or what?’
She took a deep breath. ‘All right … where do I start?’
‘How about the beginnin’, missy?’
‘OK. I’m presuming you’ve heard of Roald Waldstein?’
Heywood frowned for a moment. ‘You mean the crazy time-travel inventor guy … sure.’
‘Yes, him,’ she added.
He stared at her sternly for a few moments, then suddenly hacked out a laugh. ‘Reckon that’s a load of ol’ bull. Nobody made no proper time-travel machine. Maybe Waldstein scribbled down some half-assed theory on paper, but no one’s ever done that for real, made a machine that does that. That’s just fairy-tale myth. Kids’ stories.’
Maddy cocked her head and slowly smiled. ‘Is it?’
The old man laughed again, but then cut himself short. His watery eyes swivelled from her to the support unit, to Rashim, then back to her.
‘You said it yourself, Heywood … you said it’s just like me and Rashim came from thin air.’
His eyes slowly widened. The mocking smile began to slide from his face as he added things up and silently came to the conclusion that she wasn’t joking around. ‘You … you bein’ serious?’ he finally whispered.
‘Ours is a very long story, Heywood,’ she added.
‘Like … like I said …’ His eyes locked on hers. ‘There ain’t no sport on tonight.’
Maddy looked at Rashim for his tacit say-so.
He nodded. ‘You might as well, Maddy. As you say, there is not much time left for things to be changed.’
Rashim got up. ‘I will leave you to tell him … I will go see to the girl.’
He wandered over to the other side of the room and hunkered down beside Becks. ‘How is she?’
‘There is some borderline malnutrition. Signs of vitamin deficiency.’ Becks put the bowl of broth down on the floor. ‘She is also exhibiting symptoms of extreme mental trauma.’ Her voice softened as she looked down at the child. ‘You are not very well … are you, small girl?’
A grubby, round face turned to stare up at them. ‘Charley …’ she whispered. ‘My … my name’s Charley.’
‘Charley?’ He smiled at her. ‘My name is Rashim. And this �
� this is my good friend Becks.’ He turned to her. ‘Say hello, Becks.’
‘Hello, Charley.’
‘They t-took my mom away …’ she whispered, ignoring his introductions. ‘Took my mom away … and … and they killed Maggie.’
‘Who is Maggie?’
The girl stared past his shoulder. Her haunted eyes seemed to be reliving the events of earlier that afternoon. ‘… She tried to run away … and they shot her …’
That teenage girl with the braided hair? Rashim reached out and held Charley’s hand. Her older sister perhaps?
The girl pulled up her legs, buried her face in her knees and started to sob. He patted her narrow shoulders awkwardly. ‘It is going to be OK. We’re going to look after you now.’
Becks cocked her head and studied the small child curiously.
‘Maybe give her a hug or something?’ said Rashim.
Becks nodded. She reached out and put one arm hesitantly round the girl’s back.
Charley responded immediately; both her arms quickly unfolded and she grasped Becks tightly. She buried her face in the support unit’s shoulder and began to sob uncontrollably.
Instinctively, Becks stroked the girl’s matted hair with her other hand. ‘You are safe now.’
Rashim nodded. Encouraging Becks to carry on.
‘I will take care of you, Charley.’
CHAPTER 17
2070, Interstate 80
80 days to Kosong-ni
They were making good progress along the I-80 through Pennsylvania towards Ohio. Passing through one dead relic of a town after another, all of them long ago picked clean of anything useful. Cracked concrete and rusting corrugated iron, crumbling ruins that seemed to be held together by the weeds and brambles that twisted their way through every gap and fissure. Some of them were towns that had died long before the seas began to rise. Died back at the beginning of the century when it was decided that Indian and Chinese workers could make stuff in factories at a fraction of the cost that American workers could.
